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A review by slow_spines
Who Is Mary Sue? by Sophie Collins
challenging
3.0
This is a challenging book that makes no concessions to the reader. Initially I hated it, but the more I read it and thought about it, the more I admired it.
Collins is taking (narrow) aim at the idea that women writing women fall into two camps: those that write biographically (and in doing so, write "well"), and those that write an idealised version of themselves (those that write, basically, crap).
A Mary Sue is a fictionalised and idealised self, its claimed, necessarily grounded in its creator. The "real" woman is herself, at least partially, the product of (male) imagination and as a result is "fundamentally insecure" in an ontological sense. Is she suggesting that there is some sort of regress in this definition of female identity? Is she really asking, Who (which of us) is Mary Sue?
Its a post-structural work, so if you have no patience for that sort of thing - don't blame you - you probably won't hang around long. But it does mean she is able to play with the premise in a way I don't think you could otherwise. In being present only as Sophie Collins, quote-and-story-relayer (anecdotally referred to in the prologue), she immunises herself - as real, living author - from the very kind of criticism she is interrogating. When she explores her ideal self in The Engine, a highly symbolic and obscure prose-poem, she is able to do so in the role of absent-author, her creation an ungrounded, original ideal. If this was the intention i think its simultaneously very clever and problematic.
Images weave themselves throughout, and where one thread ends, another two begin. There's real cohesion to it, and everything feels deliberate. One image I latched on to was that of the twin. It comes up a few times, and lends credence to what I thought Collins was trying to say. I thought I'd see if she talks about the book anywhere, and found Poetry In The Library on YouTube (I'd recommend it). When it came to the poem at the start of the book that starts this "metaphor thread" - a poem which invokes Russian history and introduces the esoteric surrealism she will use throughout - she revealed that it was a poem written by Selma Bouvier to the incarcerated Sideshow Bob. This is obviously hilarious. But I'd defy anyone to read that poem and conclude that its a letter from Selma Bouvier. I suspect Collins, at the very least, doesn't mind - Bathes is quoted indirectly elsewhere.
The "poetic" moments are extremely dense and, given the subject, I think intentionally so. They grew on me, but there's still a small voice in my head going "what the fuck does any of this mean? Does she know?" Its a voice I can't quite shake, despite, ironically, being a criticism raised within the work itself. Definitely plenty for academics to write about, but not something I have the energy for (though I'm sure it'll continue to take up head space for a while).
Its a really interesting intellectual exercise ultimately devoid of any emotional heft, and I cautiously recommend it.
Collins is taking (narrow) aim at the idea that women writing women fall into two camps: those that write biographically (and in doing so, write "well"), and those that write an idealised version of themselves (those that write, basically, crap).
A Mary Sue is a fictionalised and idealised self, its claimed, necessarily grounded in its creator. The "real" woman is herself, at least partially, the product of (male) imagination and as a result is "fundamentally insecure" in an ontological sense. Is she suggesting that there is some sort of regress in this definition of female identity? Is she really asking, Who (which of us) is Mary Sue?
Its a post-structural work, so if you have no patience for that sort of thing - don't blame you - you probably won't hang around long. But it does mean she is able to play with the premise in a way I don't think you could otherwise. In being present only as Sophie Collins, quote-and-story-relayer (anecdotally referred to in the prologue), she immunises herself - as real, living author - from the very kind of criticism she is interrogating. When she explores her ideal self in The Engine, a highly symbolic and obscure prose-poem, she is able to do so in the role of absent-author, her creation an ungrounded, original ideal. If this was the intention i think its simultaneously very clever and problematic.
Images weave themselves throughout, and where one thread ends, another two begin. There's real cohesion to it, and everything feels deliberate. One image I latched on to was that of the twin. It comes up a few times, and lends credence to what I thought Collins was trying to say. I thought I'd see if she talks about the book anywhere, and found Poetry In The Library on YouTube (I'd recommend it). When it came to the poem at the start of the book that starts this "metaphor thread" - a poem which invokes Russian history and introduces the esoteric surrealism she will use throughout - she revealed that it was a poem written by Selma Bouvier to the incarcerated Sideshow Bob. This is obviously hilarious. But I'd defy anyone to read that poem and conclude that its a letter from Selma Bouvier. I suspect Collins, at the very least, doesn't mind - Bathes is quoted indirectly elsewhere.
The "poetic" moments are extremely dense and, given the subject, I think intentionally so. They grew on me, but there's still a small voice in my head going "what the fuck does any of this mean? Does she know?" Its a voice I can't quite shake, despite, ironically, being a criticism raised within the work itself. Definitely plenty for academics to write about, but not something I have the energy for (though I'm sure it'll continue to take up head space for a while).
Its a really interesting intellectual exercise ultimately devoid of any emotional heft, and I cautiously recommend it.